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Day: December 11, 2011

So… classes are done. I now have three finals left – one at 8am on Monday, and two on Tuesday, one at 8am and one at 10:30am. Prayers appreciated if you feel so inclined! These are the three I’ve been dreading – just because of the sheer amount of information required to know for them.

17 year old Leeann Worthier is the perfect girl in town – or so she says.

George Willets is the heir to a booming petroleum business.

When they announce their engagement, George’s controlling mother is unimpressed and Leeann absolutely refuses to live with her mother-in-law. So George gives his new wife a house as a wedding gift.

Thirty years before, the same house had hosted a grisly scene: George’s uncle and cousins had all been slaughtered, his aunt Robina accused of both murder and suicide.

The house is a gorgeous, well-maintained mansion but has stood empty since the tragedy. It’s intimidating, but who is Leeann to turn down a free house? When the ghost of Robina begins to haunt Leeann, she realizes she’s made a huge mistake …

My Review:

So, for a good ghost story I should be completely creeped out, afraid to turn off the lights when I go to bed.

Based on that criteria, this one wins, hands down.

Here’s what made this story so strong – yes, it had a ghost story, yes, it had a fantastic mystery – but most of all, it had an authentic voice. Leeann was perfect.

Now, I’m not saying she’s perfect as in a perfect person – because she definitely has her share of faults – vanity, self-centered-ness, disloyalty being among a few of them, but her method of speaking, the dialect Kathleen McKenna uses to tell the story through Leeann’s eyes is so incredibly powerful that I couldn’t help but feel taken into the story and led through it, as if I was holding Leann’s hand through it all.

And then there’s the murders, and the mystery, and the ghosts, and the scary house given as a wedding gift, and the lavish spending, and the relationships and so much more which rounds this book out to be one of those books that you read as the goosebumps creep up your arm and you find yourself looking over your shoulder for that small noise you just heard… I’m rambling, but I think that adequately describes how this book made me feel.